Data-driven Atmospheric Drag and Radiation Pressure Models Based on
GRACE-C Accelerometer Measurements for the Study of the Upper Atmosphere
Abstract
The atmospheric drag and the Radiation Pressure are the dominant forces
acting on LEO satellites. Many different approaches have been followed
for the modelling of these non-gravitational forces, based on the
physics and the satellite characteristics, but in many cases large
inconsistencies are present between the models and the accelerometer
measurements. Atmospheric drag is considered as the most difficult force
to model, and the Radiation Pressure models show large deviations from
the measurements depending on the b′ angle and the position of the
satellite near the entrance and the exit from the Earth’s shadow.
Numerous models have been presented for GRACE satellites but none for
GRACE-FO. The innovation of this study is the development of an
atmospheric drag and a Radiation Pressure data-driven model based only
on the accelerometer measurements of GRACE-C satellite, using least
squares principles. The atmospheric drag is modelled using accelerometer
measurements from the shadow segment of the orbit. An additional
weighted constraint is that near the middle of the sun segment of the
orbit, the drag in the x-direction should be equal to the actual
measurements due to Radiation Pressure being nearly zero. Subsequently,
we subtract the modelled drag from the real measurements in order to
estimate the Radiation Pressure which, consequently, is modelled using a
least squares frequency-domain analysis. The residual series proceeded
from the subtraction of these two models from the actual measurements of
GRACE-C accelerometer, are analyzed by taking into consideration the
local time, the spatial information and the variations of b΄ angle, as
well as their connection with electromagnetic changes in the upper
atmosphere. The proposed models have been tested for different time
periods in the last three years of GRACE C and the rms of the residual
series along the x and the z axes of the accelerometer is
~2.5 nm/s2, while the y-axis exhibits
an rms of ~1 nm/s^2.